


There Is Always A Home To Come Home To (When Your Starlight Is Faded And Broken)

by colorworld



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: F/M, He loves his daughter, Hurt, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, May bitchslaps an asshole, May's Abusive Boyfriend, Non-Graphic Rape/Non-Con, Parent Tony Stark, Rape Recovery, Rape/Non-con Elements, Recovery, Sexual Assault, Sexual assault recovery, Tony is there for Penny, Tony stark is there for Penny, Well - Freeform, dont read if youre sensitive to this stuff, it doesn't graphically occur in fic but you know what happens, non bio daughter, please tell me if i should change rating to E?, sexual assault aftermath
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-08
Updated: 2019-05-08
Packaged: 2020-02-28 12:08:27
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,542
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18756157
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/colorworld/pseuds/colorworld
Summary: Things can’t always keep getting worse, right?Wrong.Very, very wrong.OR: Penny Parker is sexually assaulted by her teacher-slash-aunt's-boyfriend, Tony is furious while trying to comfort his practically daughter, and May is out to bitch-slap a man





	There Is Always A Home To Come Home To (When Your Starlight Is Faded And Broken)

**Author's Note:**

> so i started this a few months ago and never finished so i let it be a short fic? again, please tell me if i should up the rating to E? Like, don't hesitate to tell me if you think that would be appropriate! If you like this, go ahead and comment and kudos!

Things can’t always keep getting worse, right?

 

Wrong.

 

Very, very wrong.

 

Penelope “Penny” Brooklyn Parker has suffered through bullying, dealt with the death of both her parents and her uncle, been crushed by a building, so she obviously doesn’t deserve more pain, nor did she in the first place. Trust anyone when they say she is strong as hell’s wrath because it’s the truest truth you’ll ever hear, even when she is punched in the stomach by another thing again. Again. Of course, again, because life has no mercy where it should be placed. 

 

He was alright, Hayden Ambridge. That’s all that Penny saw her aunt’s new boyfriend as: alright. He looked alright with his dark hair, tan skin, amber eyes, a loving smile towards her aunt every time he saw her. Then, there’s the fact that he’s actually the new honors history teacher at school...He taught the class she was in. 

 

His teachings were mediocre, according to her and most students. Mr. Ambridge got the point across, made minor recommendations, was happy to answer questions, wasn’t a highly judgemental teacher. The five-foot-eleven man was sufficient for a high school history class, but definitely not the best Midtown could do. Hell, Midtown never did the best they could do. They may have been decent for New York City, but when were schools ever decent, over half the time?

 

When Aunt May asked what Penny thought of Hayden dating her when she got home, Penny replied with her honesty that he was alright. Of course, May told her firmly if anything was wrong to tell her, being the loving and caring aunt she was to her niece-pretty-much-daughter. Penny replied that there was nothing wrong and that there would be nothing wrong.

 

When Mr. Stark, kinda “Dad”, as it’s evolved into through time and slip-ups Tony got secretly happy about, inquired the girl’s feelings when she came over to work on stuff and eat pizza, she answered the exact same, trusting him and her aunt with her life, with the addition to him that if Hayden made her happy, she was more than happy. That was all there was to it, and it satisfied Tony. She added the exact thing she told May, being that nothing would go to hell or be wrong.

 

Ironically, of course, she was wrong in absolute. 

 

“Miss Parker?” Mr. Ambridge casually calls Penny’s name at the end of the class two weeks after she’s met him, gone through his classes, seen him give May quick kisses and make her laugh. 

 

Ned gives her a perplexed look, but her face replies to tell him to stand down and go ahead to their usual after-school meeting place. She heads on back over to her history teacher, generally content and giddy from her day, satisfied with her A+ grade on the math quiz she got back today and a thoroughly-finished project between her and Ned was turned in with confidence. She stops with a few feet between them, prepared to hear whatever is gonna be thrown at her. 

 

“I just wanted to say that I kinda finished your history test early. Well done, Penny, you scored a ninety-five. Only a couple questions wrong, and they were the harder ones, but the bonus question boosted you up a bit, as well,” He smiles. 

 

Penny blinked, surprised that he finished grading her test a few days early. As far as she knew, he didn’t do this for other kids. “Um, thank you, Mr. Ambridge-”

 

Mr. Ambridge laughs. “I’ve been telling you to call me Hayden for a while now, me dating your amazing aunt for some weeks, now...Unless that makes you uncomfortable.”

 

“No, I just haven’t thought about it.”

 

“Well, your aunt has always said your the most polite kid she knows...So I, uh, need you to do something for me.” He plops down in his seat, reclining back, his legs too lazy to cross over themselves, pants looking quite tight on him, especially at his creepily sizey bulge. 

 

Nerves played in Penny’s head. What was this?

 

Twenty minutes later, she wished she knew the answer. 

 

In the disgust of a bathroom stall, her body feels crumpled to a ball by the events of repeated moments of horrors ago. Nothing’s real, nothing’s right, she should’ve known from the looks of his pants being that fucking tight. Her body still almost feels touched, and she just wants it all to herself, and all she wants is to...be.

 

Penny can’t lift her head, despite her neck hurting. Her feet and legs are falling asleep, and it really hurts, but she won’t move. What was the one thing she did to deserve this? Was it as simple as the one time she yelled back at Flash? Did she get too many things? Did she eat too much, proved by that bit of stomach pudge he poked and rolled his eyes about? For everything awesome about spending time with Mr. Stark, did she have to deal with something mortifying from Mr. Ambridge? Is her life a fucking trade-off? Is this what it is? Is she life’s toy to play with, bets being made from above about what will happen if this occurs, that is done to her?

 

She doesn’t know and she can’t comprehend anything. She is as blank and bland as paper. 

 

Life has thinned and distorted around her, life is a thing of her past. The only thing visible to her are the images of his advantage of her. The only thing audible is him, or maybe a split second of her heart beating, her breaths shaky and recovering slowly. 

 

The ringing of her phone disturbs her and, frankly, she wants to scrunch more, but she physically can’t do it unless she pushes, and Penny doesn’t have the will to push, for the first seconds it keeps on ringing. Finally, like a shock, it was May picking her up today.

 

May can’t know the slightest scintilla of a single thing.

 

She forces herself up from the floor with the desire to be able to just break into pieces for a long time, her legs feel as they were bruised by a baseball bat, movement of anything felt raw and wrong, wrong just as everything that had happened was. A flash came across the screen, but more like a flash across her eyes of May’s smile and name. Penny jerks her hand to her ear after answering. “Hello?” She croaks, practically wincing because she could’ve just blown her cover. 

 

“Penny? Penny, I’m outside waiting for you, are you alright?”

 

“Yeah, Aunt May, I’m alright,” Penny nods. With the will she could muster up, she forces her body onto its feet, the idea of motion feeling almost foreign to her. She’s walking out and away from the bathroom, not replying to May because she’s immediately forgotten that she’s on the phone. The school, the city, the nation, the world, the universe is a blur that’s fading from her knowledge. Has the universe ever existed at all?

 

Penny is on autopilot because she is a plane, the angel and the devil in the cockpit. The angel is piloting her, checking to make sure she keeps her head down and to prevent her eyes from letting the waterfall come back once again. The devil is the co-pilot, wanting to scream, wanting to cry, wanting to break like glass has fallen from a building, filled with whole life and a seventy-years-or-so-worth of potential mixed in. It’s blended with the concrete, now, unrecoverable. Is her life gone now? Is it? There’s no one there but Hayden Ambridge, a monster of his own creation. The angel can only sigh and move forward. The devil has tears in its eyes and wants so much better. 

 

The sight of Flash is worthless, but her car is worth something more. She wants to hop into the backseat and shriek in agony, but Penny clumsily slides into the front seat, her backpack dropped on the floor in front of her. The answers she gives are terrifyingly robotic that include “Good,”, “Great,”, and “Okay.”

 

May didn’t make too much of it, but she was still suspicious. There were no tears, not a cracking voice, she’s sure her facial expression isn’t a look of guilt. The whole way back to their apartment, not a peep from her unless asked of. They are back in their apartment soon enough, and Penny does absolutely nothing but close her door, lock it, and yank her covers open, crawling inside to the comfort of the recently-bought sheets that were nearly as soft as the ones at the guest room Mr. Stark has made up for her (in fact, he probably suggested these, but Penny had absolutely no idea what they cost). Her head is buried against the pillow, so thank god she didn’t wear foundation, today, and her mascara was waterproof. But why would that matter? Her issues are a comparison of Jupiter to an ant. Jupiter is extraordinarily massive, and an ant is meaningless and is what Jupiter’s creators would call a particle. 

 

With her duvet and blankets does Penny curl up almost like a fetus, but not quite because she’s sore, not quite hurting, but it just feels bad. She has no better way of describing it, but she’s not thinking about something so frivolous, anyways, she’s been abused, raped, stolen of her soul. Her body is not hers...was it ever?

 

Her homework doesn’t exist, despite it screaming out for attention, including her study packets, books, everything. Penny’s laptop is still their, begging for attention on Tumblr, but nothing in this world could rise her from her bed. 

 

Penelope Parker is shattered.

 

She is faded.

 

Broken.

 

Is she dead?

 

Her body practically absorbs the comfiness of the bed and she is soon asleep, not a typical afternoon with Tony or doing intense studying in her room. This man was going to come back to this apartment and she was most likely to still be sleeping when he was. 

 

It takes five hours, but she’s risen up to consciousness, messages from Ned and Tony has exploded her phone. The brief glimpse of their words echo concern and worry, but Penny says “I’m fine,” to both of them and forces herself out of bed, bones stretching and trying to catch up reality as her brain is attempting to, as well. The room is cold around her, bare without the duvet. She wants to stay inside her bed so bad, or fall asleep by Dad-Mr. Stark, whatever he’s supposed to be calling him, but really, he’s her dad. He’s there for her, no matter what and would do absolutely anything for her, but Penny wasn’t always quite sure how much was true or if it’d ever be proven. He was never going to know, though, so he didn’t have to worry about it, even though all she wanted to do was cuddle up to him like she’s done before and feel okay. They would watch a movie or a tv show, eat ice cream with a comforting arm wrapped around her shoulder, the sweet forehead kiss she gets when she’s dozing off, sometimes into sleep and sometimes not. But when it came to Tony Stark, he could always make her feel better. Always.

 

Not, now, though. 

 

He would never know. 

 

Penny really wants to cry or something because she is making herself get out of bed because she must convince May that she is absolutely fine like nothing has ever happened to her in her whole life. In her bathroom, door locked, she yanks away her clothes and tries her best to pretend the bruises are totally not there. Her body  _ totally  _ wasn’t stripped away of its protection before she got home from school. Oh, no, she had a perfect day!

 

The teen could scream. 

 

Now in a pair of pajamas, braless and lazy, stripped of her makeup, Penny exits her bedroom and is prepared to go to the kitchen to get something to snack on or make herself dinner because she does legitimately want food. 

 

But, of course, the stress made her forget Hayden would be there.

 

Penny shudders upon sight of him and her aunt on the sofa together.

 

May turns her head. “Are you okay, honey, you’ve been in your room for hours! You look exhausted-did you fall asleep!”

 

All Penny can do is a nod and cross her arms around her chest. She’s not huge, but she’s decently sized, so she can show through without her thirty-two-C bra, usually. In fact, she knew she was right now. It wouldn’t be helpful, though, because Hayden already broke those barriers. 

 

“Oh, honey, it’s alright, women go braless, I know it’s more comfortable that way. I grew up with a few sisters, so I’ve seen them deal with stuff,” Hayden says. 

 

Penny wants to shriek in agony and never stop, but her face is frozen and her face says “fucking kill me.”

 

“Aww, you’re so knowledgeable, Hayden,” May jokes, but her expression almost looks fake, and that outright scares Penny on top of everything that’s happened today. Her abuser is feet away. Her rapist is feet away. Her aunt’s boyfriend is feet away. At worst, her future step-uncle is feet away. 

 

Penny just turns around and starts heating up leftovers when May asks what she’s making. “Um, just the broccoli cheddar soup we picked up from Panera a few days ago.”

 

“Is it okay if you could heat me up a bowl, too, Pen?”

 

“Yeah, of course, Aunt May...Want some...Hayden?” Penny wants to choke on her offer. 

 

“Yeah, I’d love some, Penny, thank you so much!” Hayden accepts. 

 

“Mmhm,” Penny quickly nods and feels rushed to heat up the soup and put it in bowls, but of course, Hayden has another bomb to drop on poor Pearl Harbor. 

 

“Do you wanna watch Star Wars The Return Of The Jedi, it showed up on this cable channel? I know you adore Star Wars.”

 

Penny invisibly swallows. She’s pretty sure she rather vomit than say what she’s about to say. “Yeah, I’d love to! ...Thanks, Hayden.”

 

“Anytime, honey.”

 

At least he wasn’t calling her a good girl like earlier. 

 

She can’t make herself muster up those images. 

 

The soups were finished within minutes and she brought them both over along with coke. As they thank her, she plops down right beside May and sits in compliance as much as it kills her, Hayden just feet from her, her eyes feeling mournful because she can’t comprehend the nervous expression that pops up every once in a while on her aunt’s face. She just can’t.

  
  
  


The very next day at the very same time, the exact same thing. 

 

Penny was sick to her stomach, speed-walking to the bathroom, going inside a stall, closing it, and she threw up then and there in the toilet.

 

She felt monstrously disgusting.

 

Nothing was normal anymore. Every day was triple the living hell as normal. Flash hasn’t been doing much teasing, so at least there’s that. Ned and MJ have noticed that she wasn’t quite as bright as she used to be, but she made herself reassure them that everything was okay except that she’s been out later at night and up later in bed. Ned seemed to take her word for it more than MJ, but she eventually didn’t question her friend’s words, either. 

 

The spider-teen has been looking down, but she’s been taught to never just look down. Her strength is faltering, though, and the floor won’t sexually abuse her like people will, so her floor is the new confidant, the new friend. It can’t talk, can’t judge, it’ll catch her if she falls, even if it hurts on impact. 

 

Reality is blurring into the nothingness of the universe. Questions are not asked, jokes are not made, smiles do not appear, academic preparedness is late to its own party. She’s already missed a couple of homework assignments and it’s threatening to slaughter her good grades to chopped liver. The roller coaster has been building to the highest heights no one has ever seen. 

 

A week ago she was at its peak. 

 

The ride downwards was slow and destroying. 

  
  


Day after that? Worse. 

 

Penny didn’t want to do it as she didn’t want to do absolutely anything, but she wouldn’t accept Hayden’s threat of a C- on her latest history project, so she did it, and her mouth felt more disgusting than it ever had, her ears more plagued with his satisfaction vocalized through moans and groans, and she hates it so fucking much. 

 

When it’s over, she goes to the bathroom and brushes her teeth thoroughly as possible and uses a shit load of mouthwash, but it can't erase what she’d done, and that crushed her. 

 

As an excuse for the next four days, four days because she just chose a random number and didn’t question herself, Penny texted Tony and told him they were doing a deeply devoted project that took so much time that she couldn’t see him for a week, which Tony found highly odd, but accepted her words with caution, so she was off the hook for his suspicions for at least a little bit of time. 

 

May wasn’t home that night, so an extension of sexual abuse hell from school went home. 

 

In the closed off-ness of May and Hayden’s bedroom, he got a depressing shit ton of her for a good forty-five minutes before Hayden finally was tired and Penny made a sprint for her bedroom and locked the door, a hysteria of sobbing coming after, pulling on long pajama pants and a baggy hoodie to cover up what’s been violated. Her body was not hers anymore-it was tainted and it was Hayden’s, and would she ever have it back?

 

It’s Thursday hitting almost midnight of Friday morning when Penny sneaks out of her bedroom, desperate for some chocolate to calm her nerves. She’s been forcing herself through homework, assignments for teachers she liked, didn’t like, and the one who’s been raping and sexually abusing her. Naturally, she put her most absolutely meticulous effort into the ones for Hayden more than anyone else’s, even Mrs. Colbrooke who was her favorite teacher of all time, the most awesome and most engaging chemistry teacher she’s ever had. 

 

Penny hears a sniffle and sees her body that's dressed in lazy pajamas just like her, May’s long dark locks matted. “Aunt May?”

 

May sweeps around. “Pen, whaddya doing up?”

 

Penny herself is concerned now. God, now she knows what May is feeling, terrified of what’s going on in her head. “Are you okay? What are you doing up?”

 

“Yeah, I’m okay...I just wanted some coffee.”

 

“It’s midnight?” Penny’s brows furrow. 

 

“Still wanted coffee,” May shrugs. “Go back to bed, honey, tomorrow’s Friday! No school for two days and you get to spend a lotta time at the tower!” She reminds with a pushed and pressured sense of excitement. 

 

Penny forgets about the chocolate and goes back to bed with the hopes that it makes her aunt feel better. 

  
  
  


Her crying in the bathroom is louder than she anticipated at the end of the day ten minutes before Happy should be there to pick her up. 

 

It’s been days and absolutely no one knew. Ned did not know, nor did MJ. May did not know, Tony didn’t, Pepper didn’t, Happy, Rhodey, and literally no one knew. It was her massive secret pounding in her head, her heart, her soul, and she was horrified it made who she was more than Spider-Girl.

 

Fuck, she hasn’t been on patrol forever. 

 

Guilt skyrocketed like the rocket that would one day go to Mars.

 

As she walks out of the bathroom and to Happy’s car with freshly brushed teeth, she hears Hayden’s words over and over again. If she told May about what they’d been doing that he would do worse things to May than she thought he did to her. He really hit the weak spot, right there, threatening to hurt her aunt. She would literally die to protect May. Any hell was worth her safety and happiness. 

 

Penny slides into the back seat of Happy’s silver car and he greets her, Penny weakly smiling in response which the driver immediately finds odd, but he does not say a thing. As far as he knew, kids need space, so he simply went with letting Penny have hers. 

 

The drive to the compound is long because she’s on a rollercoaster thrusting towards tears or she’s running away from them. On and off has she been feeling like she was going to suddenly have an anxiety attack, throw up, or just start plainly crying in the middle of class, especially Hayden’s class. 

 

Penny has no idea why she even came here, she should’ve canceled on him. A rush of guilt flooded her head because it dawned on her that she was being incredibly selfish. Tony could find out because he noticed everything and she was on the constant border of mental breakdown, but no, she had to see her “dad”. 

 

“Hey, Pen!” Tony greets vibrantly in his lounge clothes, but still looking well-kept from head to toe, the look on his face is a blinding light in Penny’s darkness. “Missed you over the week, kiddo! How’s the project going?”

 

Penny simply nods, dropping her backpack on the sofa. “It’s going okay.”

 

Tony cocks his head. The man notices anything and everything in relevance to Penny or Pepper. That’s what happened when you loved people. “You’re not incredibly bubbly and like the pure ray of sunshine you always are. Talk to me, honey, are you okay?” He asks with such sincere concern in his voice Penny is shocked she hasn’t broken down already.

 

“I’m okay,” She whispers because her voice couldn’t push beyond it.

 

“No, no you’re not,” Tony practically drops his tablet on the sofa to start walking over to the teenager with whom he was deeply concerned about. “Did something happen at school, Pen? You can tell me what happened.”

 

“N-no, I’m okay,” She frantically nods her head, despite the crank of pain in her neck she’s been ignoring. Fuckfuckfuck, she’s fucking up, Penny is collapsing within herself. She can’t run, she can’t hide, all she wants to do is fucking die. So much pain, so little time, five more seconds and she was going to cry. 

 

That is exactly what happened. 

 

In five seconds, Tony Stark came so close to her and his expression was so worried like a father that the kingdom of her came crumbling down. 

 

“Hey, hey,” Tony attempts to soothe, letting her fall against him. He immediately wraps his arms around her and lets the girl cry, rubbing circles into her back, doing the best he can to comfort her, but he doesn’t know what’s wrong and it freaks him out that she’s upset because he doesn’t want her to be. The billionaire presses a kiss to her forehead. “Talk to me, sweetheart, I want to help you.”

 

“I can’t,” Penny is just barely audible. 

 

“Please, Pen, I wanna help you. How ‘bout we sit down, okay? You looked exhausted from the moment I saw you,” Tony suggests, leading her over to the sofa, wrapping her favorite sofa blanket around her and letting her body recline, but it still lying forward enough so she could turn her head enough to look him in the eyes. 

 

“I don’t wanna see you cry, sweetheart,” Tony whispers, but she’s cuddled close against him in a way that she probably can’t hear, but he doesn’t know for sure. “I need to know what happened to help you.”

 

A deep sigh from her sounds like a whoosh of wind as Tony takes her hand. “Please tell me, baby girl.”

 

“I hate it so much,” Penny practically whimpers muffled. 

 

Tony’s alarm is growing, but for her sake, he keeps his tone calm, it’s the least he can do for the sweet teenager sobbing against him. “Hate what?”

 

Penny doesn’t reply and seems to just be holding his hand a little tighter. He sighs. “It’s okay, I’ll just start guessing and just clench my hand tighter if I got it, okay, honey?” He tries. “Um...Flash?”

 

No clench. 

 

“Uh, are you having nightmares, again? Vulture?”

 

None.

 

“Did something happen between you and May? You and Ned-some boy at school act like a jerk?”

 

Then, it dawns on him. 

 

Tony prays to God that this is not how pressure is applied in his hand. 

 

“Your aunt’s boyfriend, Hayden Ambridge?”

 

His hand is being clenched harder. 

 

Tony knew he should be prepared for the worst. 

 

“I…”

 

His attention snaps back to her words away from his thoughts drowning in fear as he feels her body starting to shake. Tony tries his best to soothe her, but it isn’t working. All he can do is ait for her words, and the anticipation is horrible, but he knows what happened could easily be worse. 

 

“At-at home and at school...Oh, god,” She whispers, unable to finish her sentence. Tony feels her swallow against him as she tries again. “He...he…”

 

“You’re okay, Penny, you’re okay. Take a deep breath.,” Tony attempts, but he realizes she’s said something when he was and he is frozen in the seconds of time. He hates having to ask her. “Sweetheart, I couldn’t hear you...Did you say what I think you said?”

 

“He rapes me,” Her voice is just barely louder than before. 

 

Tony was absolutely positive he saw a vibrant flash of red. 

 

Of course, the red was representative of pure fury, rage, fucking  _ monstrous _ rage. 

 

Not his Penny, not his beautiful girl, right? This wasn’t supposed to happen to her, but Pepper wasn’t supposed to have extremis tested on her, and Rhodey wasn’t supposed to have paralyzed legs, but here she was, shaking in his arms, confessing that her aunt’s boyfriend has raped her. 

 

“Honey,” Tony’s own voice is shaky, the closest he can get to panic without himself having a breakdown. “When did it happen?”

 

“It started on Monday.”

 

Oh, yeah, he definitely saw red. 

 

“ _ Started? _ ” His voice is a mix of whisper and seething. 

 

“...He’s been doing it since Monday-please don’t tell May, please don’t,” Penny cries, now pulling her body away from him and cuddling her own body to herself. 

 

That’s when he notices the intensely purple wrist bruises under her jacket sleeve. 

 

Tony feels like an idiot-it’s a warm spring and she’s wearing a jacket. She was doing a project for five days when in reality, she was being abused by Hayden Ambridge. 

 

There have been four times he could really kill, and this was one of them.

 

“I didn’t want any of this-I didn’t,” She sobs, despite her voice muffled against her bunched-up jacket on her and it in her lap. “I didn’t want anyone to know-I didn’t want you to know!” 

 

It’s hesitant, but Tony puts a hand on her knee, her body accepting it. “If you came to me sooner, I would’ve helped you, you know I would help you with anything...And you haven’t gone to the police?”

 

“N-No.”

 

“And you haven’t told anyone?”

 

“No,” Penny sniffles. “May’s so happy with him-”

 

“Let me stop you right there, honey, May would do absolutely anything in the whole wide world for you, as would I! He’s never going to hurt you again-I promise you that, Pen.”

 

Penny keeps crying seemingly louder, her body shrinking. Oh, how terrifying it was for such a sweet, intelligent, beautiful girl to be hurt so bad and to cry so hard. 

 

“You’re not alone,” He whispers. “You need a hug? I’m not allergic-”

 

Penny’s body rolls back into his arms, her crying not dissipating in the slightest. So he holds her as what he has become is a man of mourn and a man of rage. 

 

“I got you...I got you…”

 

The teenager continues to have tears stream down her face and feel the start of a migraine come quickly in Tony’s arms. She finally finds the will to say more words. “I don’t want to keep doing this, but I have to-I have to keep May safe!”

 

Tony is quick to contradict her. “If you keep doing this, Penny, you might actually be not protecting May because he could do something to her, too. We need to call her, I’m not going to let this keep happening. In fact, I would like to physically murde-”

 

Penny’s crying makes a big influx and Tony shuts his mouth, going back to soothe her with rubbing circles in her back. A moment later after his head gears are going miles a minute, he finally finds the will to speak. “You’re gonna be okay...You’re gonna be okay, I’m gonna help you be okay.”

 

The teenage girl is slowly passing out in his arms from the crying and fatigue from holding it together. She hasn’t felt normal in any shape or form in days, so it made sense. When Tony finally realizes she’s out, he’s initially unsure of what to do, but he eventually decides to carry her against him to her guest room, yanking open the duvet to slide her in, pressing a kiss to her forehead before he leaves. 

 

The heart and soul attempting to comfort reverts back to its previous rage. Fiery, murderous rage. Not Penny...Not Penny…

 

“Fri,” Tony croaks out. He can’t even tell if he wants to cry, scream, or both. “Please...call May...and have my suit on back up.”

  
  


When Penny wakes up, her room is silent. She’s still exhausted, but not because she hasn’t had sleep, anymore. It’s because of the weight of the world on her shoulders.

 

Tony knocks on the open door. “Honey?” 

 

Penny, who was already turned over to face the door, doesn’t have the energy to get up. “Hey…”

 

“Hey,” He responds. Tony plops down on the bed, the girl in it still lying down. “I need you to come with me, Pen.”

 

“Where?” Penny whispers. She doesn’t want to be anywhere but in this bed. God, it was comfy. She’s horrified to face the world, she’s mortified to see May or Hayden. Penny already feels as if she committed a crime by confessing to Tony. 

 

“Home,” Tony answers. “You’re going home...and I’m cleaning house.”

  
  


 

Hayden is perplexed to see a billionaire at his door with Penny...holding his hand? Is she serious? What the fuck is this about?  “Tony Stark?”

 

“Yes? That’s my name?” He says as if he had to hold himself and the whole universe back from tearing this disgusting monster to shreds mercilessly. 

 

“Uh…” Hayden is surprised by the billionaire’s tone. “Come in?” He replies, turning around and walking away. 

 

“Yeah, don’t mind if I do,” Tony’s voice of return is quite harsh, gently coaxing Penny into the living room, muttering, “You’re alright, Pen, you’re alright.”

 

Hayden’s face is contoured into a panic. He sweeps around to rush out of the apartment, but a squad of police officers stands there, obviously wanting to arrest him on the fly.

 

It is at that moment that he wishes he never had to see a pair of pumps again because he gets only a flash of May’s face before he gets an intense slap to the face, causing him to yelp because that fucking hurt. 

 

May’s face is stone-cold deadly. “You can hurt me all you want...But you will never hurt my niece again.” Just because he hurt her didn’t mean he could hurt Penny. He lied when he said that if she did as told, nothing would happen to Penny. Hayden lied and she wanted to kill him. 

 

A police officer drags Hayden, who you would think has the pure embodiment of fury on his face, but as it turns out for some, Tony was much worse, at first. The man being taken away could never even fathom the rage. 

 

May rushes over to Penny who lets go of Tony’s hand and is tightly swept up in a hug by her aunt. “I’m gonna do better, next time, I promise you, Pen, I promise,” She whispers on the verge of tears. “Nothing was supposed to happen to you,” Her voice cracks. 

 

Tony’s face shows mourning for his...yeah, he could say she was practically a daughter, plus her aunt. May was right, nothing was supposed to happen to the beautiful and intelligent Penny Parker...Except something did, and it would always stay in his head for the rest of his life. 

 

May puts a hand out, waving for Tony to come in, even as her head is buried against Penny’s neck and faces the kitchen. 

 

Tony’s hesitant, but he takes a few extra steps and he is now in a hugging trio, Penny really taking to him, especially. It’s comforting and it’s sweet, something he doesn’t tend to get except from Pepper. He has to admit it’s nice, but what matters is that Penny and May are finally free, and he prays to God this will never happen again.

 

On the bright side, however, Tony knows that Happy has been making crush eyes at May. 

**Author's Note:**

> Again, I hope you liked the fic! Comment and kudos if you like! THank you so much for reading!


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